Jack Hyde is an ASU Cronkite School of Journalism student assigned to cover Arcadia for AZPreps365.com

Arcadia baseball won the first game of the season in mercy rule fashion as they dominated Desert Sunrise 13-3 on March 17.

Arcadia, led by coach Jeff Fierro, ended the game in the bottom of the fifth inning with a two-run single.

Junior centerfielder Levi Herndon stayed hot with two hits on the night.

Herndon entered the game with a batting average of .500 in 22 plate appearances, which is tied for fifth in the 4A Desert Sky Region, along with four RBIs on the season.

“I'm mainly just looking for that one pitch, every at-bat, every time the pitcher comes set,”Herndon said. “If it's there, I'm going for it. If it's not there, just spit on it.”

Arcadia had 15 hits on the night, scored six runs in the third inning, and five runs in the fifth inning which led to the mercy rule.

Players were executing on every pitch for Arcadia. 

It is to be noted that the now 0-3 Desert Sunrise, led by head coach Andrew Dixon, is in its first inaugural season as the school opened up in 2022, and it never had a baseball team the first three years.

The three runs for Desert Sunrise were scored off of a balk by Arcadia’s pitcher and an error in the outfield that scored two runners.

A junior third baseman, Brock Segui led Arcadia last season with 18 hits.

“This season, I feel like becoming a team leader and hopefully hitting at least .350,” Segui said.

Segui had a double and paired that with a lineout double play in the field at third.

Segui said he wants to have better defense this season as last season he was not satisfied.

“Just especially fielding this year, last year I was rusty,” Segui said. “I want to take over for that this year.” 

“We played a lot of top 10 teams regardless of whether it was 6A, 5A, or 4A, we played a really tough schedule, and a lot of games in a short amount of time,” Fierro said.

Arcadia went 0-4 in the 33rd Annual Adam Donnenfield Preseason Tournament last month and 0-3 in the Horizon Invitational last week.

Arcadia also lost a non-tournament game against Salpointe Catholic at home. 

Fierro said it has been a day-by-day process for the team to overcome the tough start to the season, but he said the players are staying positive while focusing on the rest of their upcoming schedule.

“Sometimes you go through struggles, and I think right now we're trying to find ourselves as a team,” Fierro said. “We’ve got a lot of guys on this team that don't have much varsity experience.”

“It's just trying to remind them that they got talent and we just have to find the chemistry and find how things are gonna work together and then just kind of piece it all together,” Fierro said.

Junior Grant Erickson, another impact player for Arcadia, was ruled out for the game with a foot injury. Erickson hurt his foot stepping on first-base on a bunt play to second.

Erickson is currently batting .429 with six hits and two RBIs in 19 plate appearances.

Erickson already has more plate appearances this season compared to last season.

“During the offseason, me and a guy from the team Brock (Segui) put in endless hours, day after day,” Erickson said.